


the night we met i knew i needed you

by sultrygoblin



Category: Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:21:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23602258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sultrygoblin/pseuds/sultrygoblin
Summary: one shot - request - he’s thankful for each step you take in his direction
Relationships: Wilhelm Wicki/Original Female Character(s), Wilhelm Wicki/Reader
Kudos: 14





	the night we met i knew i needed you

**Author's Note:**

> i love wilhelm. i think he’s stoic and romantic and perfect. and i made that all up in my head but i don’t care. he just wants her to let him love her!!!! i hope this lived up to your expectations  
> "“ Ohhhh that Wilhelm Wicki one.. any chance to have some sort of incredible followup to that?? Loooove your work !!! Spent hours on here!!!” follow up to my prvious wicki fic 'you be my queen and i'll be your moat'

It was a new feeling, the sensation of being looked out for, not watched, just observed. Cared for. You kept trying to remember those two words because that’s what was happening. No subtext, no ulterior motive, Wilhelm cared for you. It really hadn’t changed much. They were still at war and they had their duties. There isn’t time to dwell on the conversation they’d had that morning, trudging through the mud of France towards the Territoire de Belfort, there’s a few camps there they can work through. You don’t see much of each other. You get sent ahead with Omar, they’re small and quick, best for recon. He and Stiglitz take the head, far enough from camp to please ignorance of the men, but not so far as to be unreachable. By the third day, you and the young man had made it back to camp with more than enough information to take the small group. Seven, maybe eight men, but they hear chatter from the men, something about the group ahead in the orchard. He watches you speak, pointing at the map as your companion tacks on anything left out. It won’t be difficult to get in and out, it’s just making sure to get hostages. Everyone will get an earful from the Lieutenant in the morning about being to trigger-happy.

You’re passing by him, heading towards the small fire to warm what you can, when he can’t help himself, shooting an arm out to grab your wrist, “Can I see you?” stealing his hand back and keeping his attention of your.

“Let me warm up,” continuing on your way.

You crouch, getting as close as you dare, trying to dry out the dampness that had settled in your clothes and ease the chill that seemed ever-present in your bones. It was a moment that reminded you you hadn’t imagined that morning or made up the instances that had happened since. A quick catch when you had lost your footing, a lingering gaze, the brushing of his hand against yours when he’d passed off the pistol for your mission. In the few moments you could spare, you had to admit, you thought of him. It felt odd, to have denied yourself the feeling for so long and to slip into it, tailored as if just for yourself. He doesn’t shower you with attention, doesn’t wrap his arm around you and deem you his girl. Wilhelm told you all you needed to know in those moments. That he cared. He’s deliberate with his movements, making sure you look up when he takes a step out of the clearing and into the woods.

Taking a shuddering breath, you waited a few more moments. The men began their evening activities, which you would prefer not to be around for if given the option regardless, but even before it wasn’t a hard decision. Rising slowly, you’re thankful the heat has seemed to ease your aching joints. It makes it easy to move quickly, darting through the trees where he had been moments before. Slowly and carefully you keep your aim straight, what you could manage, until the lights and noises of the camp had faded.

“I thought you might not come,” his voice comes from the dark, sparking a match and using it to light an obscured lantern, enough to give light that treetops had stolen.

But not so much as to be noticed by friend or foe. You don’t know what to say, instead you just turns and smiles. Taking in the tousle of his hair, how gently he rested his rifle against a nearby tree before looking up at you. It happens all over when he looks at you, you are so wonderfully terrified you simple stands there silent. Only able to hope you looked more stoic than dumbstruck. Especially when he smiles at you. It’s a small thing, obscured by shadows, but it’s for you, without prompting, without expectation. It’s one of your new favorite things. There are so few things to smile about that it feels good -if still uncomfortable- to be the reason he does.

“Here or back?” is what you manage, his smile grows and your face flushes.

He steps slowly, as one does approaching a stray dog. You might be offended if it didn’t come with an ulterior motive. One day he won’t have to step so carefully, easing you into it, but it isn’t time, not for either of them.

“Both,” stopping just short of being toe to toe with you, even as he ached to pull you closer, “I always worry you won’t come back.”

Always. It’s a small word, all the letters soft. But it knocks the air right out of you with its implications. Your head is spinning with thoughts that tug you’re in too many directions.

“Will you come back now?”

It cuts through the noise, the seemingly unstoppable shouting in your head that tries to make you wonder if this is a good idea. If you were honest with yourself, they had been there long before this. Eager to tear and rip apart everything you tried to make good. Giving everything a cynical dinge that made anything more than arm’s length acquaintanceship nigh impossible. That question silences them all, it’s the only question that matters.

“I don’t like leaving in the first place,” it’s the first apologetic smile you’ve ever given and really meant, “I’ve never done any of this before.”

“Unberuhrt,” there are other words he could have chosen, but it seems to fit the best, “Ich könnte eine Million Mädchen küssen, aber es würde nicht so viel bedeuten, wie deine Hand zu halten.”

Your mouth is suddenly very dry, the butterflies are back. He sure has banished the voices because it’s impossible to grasp onto a thought. Once back home you would apologize to many women you had mocked for this sensation because you finally understood it. Why would you willingly walk away from such a feeling? He does as implied, a simple gesture of palm to palm, fingers lacing each other’s. You almost cling to him, holding tighter than you know is necessary but unable to stop yourself, if only to ground yourself at the moment somehow.

“Why me?” the question flying much like a particularly slippery fish.

He looks sternly down at you, “There was only you, Liebling,” daring to push forward by taking your chin in a loose grip between his thumb and curled fingers, “We have the keys to each other’s locks, we have no choice in that.”

You know what he’s implying, you know that you think it’s ridiculous, but for some reason you believe what he’s saying. Whether it’s the lantern light reflecting in those blue pools that seem to be digging inside your very soul or that he speaks with such conviction. He knows it’s true. Why doesn’t you? There was no out there who was going to love you, it seemed pointless to entertain the idea that there would be someone out there who was meant to. You think of all the things that had to happen for them to be here, every step that lead here, and the more you thought, the more it seemed less and less coincidence, luck, and happenstance.

His smile is large now, bigger than you’ve ever seen, “I knew we would get there eventually,” his thumb moves, the tip barely brushing the heavy bottom curve of your lip, “You’re not weak and this isn’t a defeat. The war is out there, not between us.”

But you are weak, your gaze flicking to his lips and back again, “I know that,” fisting your hand in the front of his jacket as you will the words from somewhere deep inside, “I just don’t know what I’m doing and I don’t,” it’s so against everything you’d made yourself to be but it isn’t, “What if I’m disappointing?”

“Impossible,” the word barely dropping from your mouth before he speaks the word, “You are you, that is what matters. Everything else,” raising his eyebrows, daring another pass across that curve, “You can learn.”

It’s another one of those moments between them were words became redundant but it won’t be a shared look, a passing touch, you knew it would happen and yet you were still unprepared. Clinging to him, trusting him. It’s been so long since he’s been someone’s first, he almost goes straight for more but pulls the reins. There will be plenty of time later to teach you all that. He simply held his lips against yours until he’d felt the tension begin to ease, nails releasing the flesh on his hand they’d begun to dig into. Leaning just the barest bit towards him, an errant sigh escaping against his lips. He pushes onward, coaxing your lips to move against his own. You focus, careful of each and every movement. Wilhelm lifts their joined hands, peeling his away once he’d placed you against his collarbone. It happens in a blink. Arm around your waist, hauling you against him, you gasped, his hand dug into your hair, tongue slipping into your open mouth.

You are almost literally been swept off your feet and you adore the feeling. It’s not up to you to know what to do, he’ll teach you, you’ll learn, and sometimes, in a moment like this, he’ll simply take what he needs from you. It had been an idea you had found appalling, wondering how any woman could enjoy being taken advantage of. The simple answer was because they were not. In fact, as long as he promised to kiss you like this forever, you would let him do whatever he’d like. A dangerous, heady feeling that is far better than whiskey. Your mother, your cousins, your friends, all of them. They had all tried to explain the feeling and always failed for words. There were none. It was simply falling, falling, and never having to touch the ground. Wilhelm will never let you.

“Oh, shit!” they can’t move apart fast enough, “Now it all makes sense!” Donowitz opening his big fat mouth.

“What’re you doing out here?” rolling your eyes.

Barely holding themselves together, “Gotta piss.”

“Then go piss somewhere else,” the words coming through gritted teeth. It hadn’t been a choice.

He held up his hands, backing up slowly, “Alright! Don’t get your panties in a twist-”

You held up your hand, shaking your head. By the time they made it back to camp, everyone would know. At least he was gone. The moments over, you don’t know why or how, it just feels impossible to step back into that far away world.

“Don’t you dare,” he doesn’t waste a second, dragging your back against him, “Do you really want to go back there now?”

You had been so very wrong, an arm around your waist and a lusty look. It was like Donowitz had never showed up.

_edit! the first word he calls you is pure and then the sentence is akin to “i could kiss a million girls but it would never compare to holding your hand”_

**Author's Note:**

> Edit! The first word he calls her is pure and then the sentence is akin to "I could kiss a million girls but it would never compare to holding your hand"


End file.
